Tellin’ Stories
Stories set to music—a whole show’s worth!—is what you’ll get at the Odd Rock Story Hour! Continue reading
Do I Belong in Brooklyn Anymore?
The dulcet tones of an acoustic guitar meet the soft voice of Rob Paravonian as he asks that musical question: “do I belong in Brooklyn anymore?” Continue reading
Rockin’ Hill Valley!
Back in Time—Lost Hits of the 80s Vol. 2 is out! The charity album is a collection of 15 tunes from contemporary artists that were created to sound like they’re from that wonderful decade of the 80s, with all proceeds going to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s research.
Back in Time—Lost Hits of the 80s Vol. 2 hit the digital shelves yesterday and it is name your price! All of artists donated their songs, time, and talent to the project to maximize the benefit for the MJFF. The result is an amazing collection of songs with influences that run the spectrum of 80s music. You’ll hear strains of The Police, The Alarm, The Cars, Madness, Depeche Mode, and many others in the 15 tracks assembled here.
Give it a listen and grab yourself a copy. You’ll be getting some fun tunes and and you’ll be helping a great cause!
Got Some Dope New Promo Shots!
Thanks to the very talented Jon Taylor I have some great new press and promo shots to share! We did some charactery portraits, some actory portraits, and some shots with the guitar and I love ’em all!
I’m sure my fellow performers know how tricky it can be to get a good headshot or promo shot—one that captures your personality and conveys something about your work. I think Jon really captured some great moments and looks. Look for the new pics in a new show flyer, poster, or real estate bench ad soon!
Thank you Jon Taylor Photo!
Music Fest Season Starts When WE Say it Does!
If you love music but not the idea of standing outside all day with sweaty idiots, then we’ve got the place for you! New York’s hottest new music festival is Spring Festerella, presented by the Odd Rock Comedy Hour!
It’s only 85 minutes, a measly $10 ($7 if you buy advance tickets here with the code ORCHVIP), and it’s in Astoria so you can go home afterward and not sleep in a tent! It’s compact, streamlined, and filled with more awesome-per-dollar than any other music festival your bloggersnob friends have told you about.
Don’t believe me? Check out these acts:
- The Reformed Whores They’ve been on IFC, SiriusXM, opened for Les Claypool and the Reverend Horton Heat, and have rocked the Edinburgh Fringe!
- Carla Ulbrich A comedy songwriter and professional smart aleck who’s been played on the Dr. Demento Show, SiriusXM, and NPR!
- Charles McBee a hilarious standup comedian who has appeared on Gotham Comedy Live!
- Tim Ellis comedian/musician whose album and webseries Casual Pimpin’ are packed with hilarity and smooth grooves!
- Shane Morrison comedic songwriter who has been featured in the New York Funny Songs Festival!
- Hosted by Rob Paravonian, me, and I’ve also done stuff and been on things!
So there you have it. April 21st, 2018, is the official start of your summer festival season! Come on out and party with us!
The Fake Band Trivia Challenge!
Are you ready to test your fake band knowledge? The Fake Band Trivia Challenge draws questions from 50 years of fictitious bands from movies, TV, and print! That’s half a century of fake bands!
There are 3 rounds of 11 questions. Yes, because these rounds GO TO ELEVEN! But I couldn’t even stop there, there are a few bonus points available in each round, so the total possible points are: Round 1: 15 possible pts; Round 2: 17 possible points; Round 3: 16 possible points; for a grand total of 48 possible points!
This challenge was created for my monthly variety show at QED in Astoria—The Odd Rock Comedy Hour, which I renamed the SHAM Rock Comedy Hour for St. Patrick’s Day—and the winning team took the crown with 20 points.
Will you do better? Will you hate me for leaving out your favorite fake band? Only one way to tell! Grab some paper to write down your answers and good luck!
Start the challenge with Round 1!
I’m Just Here For The Swag!
Be honest: are you at that vendor’s booth because you’re interested in their new smart clipboards or because they’re giving out free bluetooth ear buds? I thought so. And I understand!
Conventions, whether they’re amazing or boring, are judged by the amount of free stuff you can grab. It’s like a cross between Supermarket Spree and trick-or-treating for adults. You gotta plan your strategy. You have to stretch. And most of all, you need to get the tote bags first so you can carry the rest of it home.
I’m really happy with the music for this one. It’s a fun, uptempo funk/R&B jam with some horn licks and a bass line that was fun to lay down. Oddly enough I originally wrote this song on another subject with a whole different set of lyrics. Subject-wise the original draft’s humor was pretty subtle so instead of diving in and recording it I mulled it over for a while to see if I could find another subject that would work with the same groove and melody.
Last week the idea hit me and I cranked out the lyrics—including a 16-bar rap I’m pretty proud of—in one long writing session (thank you to the first of 3 Nor’easters that hit NYC in the past 2 weeks, giving me uninterrupted time to work)!
I hope you like it, and if you do feel free to comment, pass it along to your friends, and say hi on the social thingies.
It started with a pun, now we’re here!
I’ve accidentally embarked on the quest to create the most epic fake band trivia challenge ever!! It started as a play on words—“Sham Rock” instead of “Odd Rock” Comedy Hour to acknowledge that the March installment of my monthly variety show falls on St. Patrick’s Day.
“I’ll do a couple of covers from fictitious TV and film bands,” I thought.
“I’ll show slides of some of the more esoteric fictitious bands,” I pondered.
But when I had the idea to create a fake band trivia contest I had no idea it would become my mission in life to create the MOST AMAZING AND TRULY AWESOME FAKE BAND TRIVIA CONTEST EVER!! I’m having an absolute blast putting these questions together, I think I may have found my calling in life!
The questions will range in difficulty from “everyone should know that” to “why would anyone know that?” with a lot of room in between. Some questions will be easy with supplemental bonus points for more in-depth knowledge on the same subject. There will be some “everyone wins” questions with prizes for anyone who gets it right. So even if you answer only one question right you could still get a prize.
And on top of this epicness we still have great comedy and music: dope and dirty rhymes from La Dynasty and standup comedy from Boris Khaykin, and more! So get your tickets now! It’s only ten bucks, but you can get tix for seven dollareedoos with the discount code ORCHVIP at QED’s website.
All right, back to the research…
Celebrate St. Pat’s w/ the >SHAM< Rock Comedy Hour!
When your monthly variety show falls on St. Patrick’s Day you gotta do something special, but instead of appropriating (and/or mocking) Irish culture we’ll be celebrating fake bands in The Sham Rock Comedy Hour!
That’s right! We’ll be celebrating all of your favorite sham bands from movies and TV! I’ll be covering some of the best examples of real music from fake bands, and we’ll also have a fake band trivia game (prize to be determined but it’ll probably be dope). Plus comedian Boris Khaykin, the dope and dirty rhymes of LaDynasty, and more!
So get yer butts down to the March edition of The Odd Sham Rock Comedy Hour! Advance tickets are only $7 when you buy at QED’s website with the code “ORCHVIP”
One Simple Trick for Recording Vocals in Logic Pro X!
I am overjoyed to report that I have found a solution to one of my biggest complaints when switching from Pro Tools to Logic Pro X! Continue reading
The Odd Rock Comedy Hour—Feb 17, 7:30
Last month’s Odd Rock Comedy Hour had a packed house so make your plans now for the February installment! Continue reading
Flight ’17—video & music
I was working on a mellow instrumental piece of music and thought it would fit well with some iPhone footage I took of my travels last year so here it is. Continue reading
The Missile-Toad Holiday Special ’17!
The Odd Rock Comedy Hour is putting on an odd rock holiday show! Comedy music superduo Sam & Bill, Killy Dwyer, Lauren Hope Krass and me, Rob P., will bring to the stage twisted musical holiday cheer in the form of top-notch comedy, music, standup, sketch, and candy! And if you get your tickets in advance and use code ORCHVIP, you can get in for just $7!
It all takes place on Saturday, Dec. 16th at 7:30 pm at Q.E.D. in lovely Astoria, Queens. The Odd Rock Comedy Hour will help make your season hilarious.
The Odd Rock Comedy Hour
Missile-Toad Holiday Special!
Sat. Dec. 16, 7:30 pm
Q.E.D.
27-16 23rd Ave, Astoria (N Train to Ditmars)
With Sam & Bill, Killy Dwyer, Lauren Hope Krass, and more!
Dang, that’s a great title for a song…
He may have lost touch with the working man, but Senator Chuck Grassley can come up with a great title for a resort rock song. “Booze or women or movies”? That’s just too good to not Buffetize!
Sometimes you just gotta put on your flip flops, pick up your guitar and make fun of the news. Enjoy the tune and remember, if you don’t have $5.5 in the bank when you die, you’re a bad person!
Some pics from a Canadian cruise!
My second-ever cruise gig took me from New York City up to the Canadian towns of Charlottetown on Prince Edward Island and Sydney in Nova Scotia. Here are some of the purdy pictures I took.
The Odd Rock Comedy Hour! Coming Nov 18!
The Odd Rock Comedy Hour, my new monthly comedy/music/variety show, launches Saturday, Nov 18 at Q.E.D.! After a great 3-year run of my monthly show Don’t Feed the Musicians! I’m ready to kick off a new show that will feature the best of what you’ve come to love from the old show along with some new twists and turns.
One of the reasons for the name change is that I wanted the name to clearly convey that the show was a fun collection of comedy, music, and something a little off the beaten path. Also, the name Don’t Feed the Musicians! is kind of bossy when you think about it.
The new name is inspired by a very quirky rock club in Milwaukee where my old band The Steppingstones played our first gig: The Odd Rock Cafe. The venue was a converted Victorian house in an industrial section of the city and all of the interesting 80s acts played there: The Jesus Lizard, Gwar, G. G. Allin, Social Distortion, and many more. We opened for a Milwaukee-based psychedelic jangle-pop band The Petals and we were so amped to be playing our first gig we blew through our entire set in about 30 minutes.
We came off the stage to some confused looks from members of the Petals.“You’re done?” The asked if we wanted to play a few more and we had to respond, “we don’t know any more.” We should have pulled the line Bob Newhart used after his first nightclub gig earned him calls for an encore. He came back out on stage and said “Okay, which one do you want to hear again?”
So there you have it: somewhere between quirky music with a D.I.Y. aesthetic and Bob Newhart lies The Odd Rock Comedy Hour. Coming to Q.E.D. on the 3rd Saturday of every month at 7:30 pm. Come join the fun!